


the bright and black

by Anemoi



Category: Football RPF
Genre: Astronaut AU, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-01
Updated: 2015-11-01
Packaged: 2018-04-27 12:31:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5048644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anemoi/pseuds/Anemoi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The backup generator fails in the sixth week.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the bright and black

**Author's Note:**

  * For [saltstreets](https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltstreets/gifts).



> i know absolutely nothing about...space...and...astronauts...it turns out. i thought i could bullshit my way through it, but the actual sci fi part is woefully inadequate. pls forgive.

The backup generator fails in the sixth week.

 

-

  
  


Because Thomas Müller wouldn’t be Thomas Müller if he didn’t have a backup generator to the backup generator, the crew was still breathing oxygen.

  “How long is this one supposed to last?” Philipp says, frowning, arms folded in front of his chest.

  Thomas licks peanut butter off a spoon. “I have no clue. It’s not actually supposed to be working. I was surprised when it started.”

   “Are we out of knives?” he asks, rummaging in the drawer. Mario shrugs.

   “Is the communication systems working?” Philipp turns to Bastian.

   Bastian shakes his head. “I open it up and there’s just static. I can’t even get through to Command Center on Earth.”

   Philipp was never one to make public shows of concern. He turns away, and Thomas feels his stomach sink a little.

  

 

-

 

He’s sitting by a window later when Miro joins him. The sun’s peeking from the curve of the Earth below them, light rays spiking through the darkness. Thomas looks up when he feels Miro’s warm hand between his shoulder blades. Miro smiles at him reassuringly, and Thomas smiles back like he couldn’t help it.  

  “How are you feeling?” Miro says, settling down on the seat in front of him. The space between them was narrow, and their knees brushed. Thomas looks out at the Earth through the frosted double paned glass.

  “Weird,” Thomas admits.

  Miro’s smiling faintly. “That’s not unusual.”

  “We can still get out. I checked the escape pods,” Thomas says.

  “Yes. But-”

  “Philipp will wait until the last second. I know,” Thomas sighs.

 “This is our last chance, Thomas,” Miro says. Thomas watches his face in the light of the sunrise. The sunrise never gets old, even though he’s seen more than enough for the six weeks they’ve been in the station.

 “I know,” Thomas says, getting up. “I just hope it pays off.”

 

-

  
  


The station was completely empty except for the six of them. Thomas does a mental tally as he walks to the generators. Mario in the sleeping quarters, probably. The stress was getting to him. Miro heading to the control room, where Philipp and Bastian are working on getting the communications system back up. And Manu nearing the end of his shift in the generator room. Six of them, miles and miles above the rest of humanity below, spinning slowly in the darkness punctured by billions of stars.

 Thomas bites his tongue and counts slowly to ten. Lisa had taught him the trick back on Earth. “It works when I get too nervous before a competition,” she’d said, smiling. The memory of her face calms him more than the numbers.

  He runs a hand against the walls as he strides down the corridor. They’re still waiting, but they’re running out of time.

  
  


-

 

“What does the failure of this mission mean, exactly?” he asks, poking a wrench experimentally at the exposed circuitry. Manu tips his head to one side.

“It’ll be over.”

“All of it?”

“Everything Philipp worked for. Command is pressuring him to retire, get a desk job. This is the last chance he has to prove there’s something worth it up here. The country just doesn’t have enough money to burn on space exploration anymore, much less extraterrestrials.”

The knowledge settled cold in Thomas’ heart. They were perennially at the edge of knowing, waiting for some surety, and they were so close to it now.

“Shit,” he says, and stops. “No wonder he’s pushing us to stay.”

“We have to go if the generators don’t start,” Manu says. “That’ll leave us no choice.”

Thomas stares at the wall of dark signal lights in front of him, and rubs a hand over his face.

“Shit,” he says again. “Get me some coffee.”

Manu leaves him with a faint smile and a shoulder squeeze.

  
  
  


-

 

He wakes up some time later, to Miro’s voice. “Thomas?”

“Miro?” he replies, groggy. Thomas sits up and yawns.

“How is it going?” Miro asks, handing him a sandwhich.

“I think I coaxed about 40 hours out of it,” Thomas says, “Give or take.”

“Good work.” Miro says, biting into his own.

Thomas looks at the generators in front of him and the spanner in his hand, the intricate instruments laid out beside him. It was an effort for his eyes to focus, since his vision kept blurring away over the individual outputs and inputs, the electrical wires and rows of switches.

“This is worth it, right?” he asks Miro, suddenly. “It’s worth it.”

Miro nods without hesitation, and they sit side by side till the warning light goes yellow and Thomas puts down his sandwich with a sigh and reaches up to check it.

 

-

  
  


Mario’s sitting by the dining room table, playing solitaire while eating peanuts out of a packet. Thomas slides into the seat in front of him, steeples his fingers mock seriously.

  “Hello, Mario,” he says.

  “Hello,” Mario says, offers him the packet. “How are the generators looking?”

  “Doing okay,” Thomas says, “Miro’s taking a turn with them now while I get some sleep.”

  “Is there anything we can do?” Mario says, frowning slightly.

  “Wait. Wait for Bastian to get through to Command on Earth,” Thomas shrugs. Mario methodically deals another hand. Thomas wonders what it was like to be so young and facing possible death.

 “This is your first mission?” Thomas asks, knowing the answer.

 Mario shrugs. “Yep.”

 “Sorry it went all pear shaped,” Thomas says. “I swear it won’t be like this every time.”

 Mario cracks a grin. “I’ll take your word for it.” Thomas looks at him and notices the dark shadows under his eyes, for the first time. The florescent lights seem dimmer all of a sudden.

  “Have you been sleeping?” Thomas says, leaning closer.

  Mario shakes his head. “It’s kind of hard to.”

 Thomas wants to ask him what made him volunteer for the mission. Surely there were other routes to success other than living in a crumbling space station, waiting for aliens that may or may not be there to signal. Mario Gotze was supposedly the brightest young mind in modern mathematics.

 

“What are you going to do when you get home?” he asks instead, stealing another peanut. “Tell me, what do you do apart from number crunch, little nerd?”

Mario grins at him, his eyes brightening. He shoves Thomas’ shoulder, and shrugs a little self deprecatingly. “I’ll play football with my brothers, I suppose. Our whole family loves it.”

“Oh? What team do you support?”  

 

-

 

“Aliens?” Bastian says, raising an eyebrow. The communication systems panel was wide open in front of him, the wires torn out like the veins of some beast. Bastian snips a strand, presses a button. Nothing happens.

“Maybe,” Philipp says, putting down his pencil. “Do you really think we’re alone out here?”

“No. Not after that message we got,” Bastian shakes his head. “It just makes me wonder why they’re crippling us when they’ve sent a message.”

“I know. But they weren’t hostile. Command would never have sent us here if they were hostile.”

“They would have, Philipp.” Bastian says, not looking at him, focused on his work. Philipp watches his eyebrows knit together in concentration.

“Try again.” Bastian says, holding two wires together, crocodile clip in his mouth.  

Philipp reaches an arm across, holding his breath. He presses the button.

 

The screen makes a soft hum and lights up.

  
  


-

 

“What did you say?” Mario says, squinting at the screen. They’re standing around it, Bastian typing so fast his fingers a blur on the keyboard.

Thomas slowly manages to turn a complete circle on his rolly chair. “Please tell me the aliens are real.”

“We know they’re real,” Miro says, smiles at him from where he’s standing, bent over Bastian.

“Please tell me they don’t want to leave us stranded in space,” Thomas says.

“That’s yet to be determined,” Bastian spares him a glance. “Will you go down to check the generators again?

  Thomas mock salutes and bounds up.

  
  


-

 

“- you can’t stand at the forefront of space exploration and say no, Bastian. I don’t understand it,” Philipp stops when he sees Thomas, frowns.

 “I just want to tell you the generators are down. They won’t start up, I’ve tried everything. We have twenty hours before oxygen runs out.”

“What?” Philipp says, confused. “I thought we were back on track.”

“We barely got through to Command, Philipp,” Bastian says, looking up at him. “We need to go back now. We’ve done everything we could.”

Thomas didn’t think Philipp would condemn them all to death just so they can wait for whatever small green men out there to contact them again, but it was strange. Space fucked with all their minds.

 “Fips,” he starts to say, unnecessarily it turned out, because Philipp’s face softened.

 “Check the escape pods. We’ll give it fourteen hours more and then clear out.”

  
  
  


-

  
  


“Philipp,” Bastian says. “Come on.”

“A second more,” Philipp says, stubbornly doesn’t look away from the screen as Mario types furiously beside him.   
“We have to go, Philipp,” Bastian says again, his knuckles white on the frame of the door.

“You go on ahead,” Philipp says, meets his eyes like a challenge.

“I’m not going until you two both come with me,” Bastian says again, “We need to evacuate. Now.” The alarm goes off before the last word leaves Bastian’s mouth. Mario’s head jerks up for a second as the klaxon blares but he’s still hunched over the keyboard, and Bastian almost sees red with the desperation he feels.

“Please-” he says, as Mario says at the same time, “I got an answer back-”

“Let’s get out,” Philipp says, and they sprint for the evacuation pods.

 

-

 

“What did they say?” Miro says in the quiet. The alarm sounds from the main station didn’t carry through the vacuum.

Mario’s busy with the control switchboard. He turns his head as the escape pods slowly starts its detachment process and Miro catches his bright grin through the helmet.  

“Enough,” Mario says.

  
  


-

  
  


“I’m sorry,” Philipp says, abrupt. They’re falling faster now, the walls shuddering and heating up as they neared the atmosphere. “I know- I know you didn’t want to come on this mission.”

They were facing each other, but they couldn’t move. Bastian just stares at Philipp, unblinking, and hopes it gets through to him.

“Philipp,” he says, “I’ll support you whatever-”

  
  


-

  
  


“Hold on, Thomas.”

“Are you afraid?” Thomas says. Everything starts shuddering around him, something focused in the middle of his forehead, pressing down on his entire body. His hands tingle. He can see a sliver of Manu’s forehead and his eyes, wide open. The world outside is on fire.

“What?” Thomas says, “Speak louder.”

“No.” Manu yells as the bottom falls out of both their stomachs. The seats juddering around them, the sound of tearing metal, and Thomas has both eyes screwed shut and his hands clenching on his armrests.

He’s grinning, sort of helplessly. _What a fucking way to go._

 

-

  
  
  


Before they hit the surface of the ocean, Philipp has time to say “Bastian, what-”

  
  


-

 

“Mario?” Thomas yells. “Miro? Fips? Basti?” They’re bobbing up and down on the waves in an orange lifeboat, still slowly inflating. Thomas’ hair is stuck to his forehead, and Manu’s strapping on a life vest.

  “Here!” Mario gasps, circling around from behind the pod. “Come over here.”

  “Are there paddles?” Manu sighs, “I can’t believe there are no goddamn paddles.”

  Thomas lies down on his stomach on the front part of the boat and uses his hands like he’s swimming a front crawl. They get closer to Mario and Miro, clinging on to the escape pod like two drowned limpets.  

  “Where’s Fips and Basti?” he says, when they’re all sitting on the boat, trying to breathe. Everything tastes like salt, and the air felt unreal. There was so much of it, for one thing. Heavy in his lungs, clean and scalding.

   “Come on, let’s go over. I can hear them yelling,” Miro gestures at a distant shape. “Probably behind that pod.”

 

-

 

 “Absolutely not.” Bastian says, not looking at him. They’re floating, holding on to the side of the escape pod.

 “You mean you don’t want near death experiences to be part of your daily routine?” Philipp says. The others were getting closer. He can spot Thomas in front, waving his arms above his head.

  “No,” Bastian says, turning to smile at him. Philipp swallows saltwater at the sudden blueness of his eyes, the way he looks outlined against the waves.

  “No?” Philipp says, looking away. He hears the sound of helicopter rotors.

  “We’re getting there!” Thomas yells across the water, cheerful.   
   

Bastian moves his hand across to Philipp’s on the rail they were gripping to stay anchored. Philipp almost doesn’t feel it, since both their hands were icy, past the point of numbness.

  “Alright!” Philipp yells back. Then he turns his head and says, softer, “Alright.” And Bastian smiles again.

 Philipp looks up at the sky. They’ve made it home. Then he focuses on the figures of his crew as they get bigger and bigger, across the choppy waves.

 

 

 

 


End file.
